Category Archives: Civic Engagement Survey

National Commission on Political Reform Releases New Poll on American Attitudes Toward Public and Community Service at National Town Meeting

Survey Finds Public Reluctance To Serve In Government, Strong Interest In Community Service

PHILADELPHIA,Â July 23, 2013Â /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — The Bipartisan Policy Center’s (BPC)Â CommissionÂ on Political ReformÂ andÂ USAÂ TODAYÂ released a new national poll yesterday that shows Americans are interested in participating in public service, but are reluctant to run for and serve in public office.Â The poll, conducted by the bipartisan team ofÂ Whit AyresÂ andÂ Mark Mellman for BPC andÂ USAÂ TODAY, was released as part of the commission’s second National Conversation on American Unity, a town hall meeting.Â View more about the pollÂ here……

Civic Engagement in the Digital Age

Read Full Report

OVERVIEW

Social networking sites have grown more important in recent years as a venue for political involvement, learning, and debate. Overall, 39% of all American adults took part in some sort of political activity on a social networking site during the 2012 campaign…..read more

Deliberative Forums: How to Convene and Moderate â€“ A free webinar presented by the ALA Center for Civic Life and ProgrammingLibrarian.org onTuesday, February 28, 4 pm EST. More information: www.programminglibrarian.org

Make Your Library a Community Leader: Community Building through Civic Dialogue – A preconference to be held at the PLA National Conference, March 13-14, 2012. More information: www.placonference.org

Civic Reflection Builds Community Connections: A Program Model for Libraries â€“ A preconference to be held at the ALA Annual Conference, June 21-22, 2012. More information: www.alaannual.orgÂ

The Libraries and Civic Engagement Survey is now online. If you have not already completed the survey, please take a few minutes to answer a short questionnaire that tells us about your work in this arena. You can also fill out the survey if you have undertaken additional civic engagement activities not previously reported.

The ALA Center for Civic Life is surveying libraries to find out more about their civic/community engagement activities. Public, school, academic, government, state and special libraries are undertaking exciting programs that engage their communities in civic life.

Please fill out the survey at http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/LibraryCivicEngagement. We would like to hear from you by the end of December. We will use the data to map the civic work going on throughout the country and highlight your important work. The map will help others find you and link you to similarly minded groups in your area. Thanks.

If you haven’t already filled out our civic engagement survey, it’s not too late to be counted and get onto ALA’s civic engagement map! We continue to survey libraries to find out more about their civic/community engagement activities. Public, school, academic, government, state and special libraries are undertaking exciting programs that engage their communities in civic life. Please fill out the survey posted at: http://connect.ala.org/node/153750 and return it to us as soon as possible. We have included a sample survey so you can get a better sense of the type of efforts of interest. Many thanks!Â Hope you’ll encourage others to complete the survey as well.

The ALA Center for Civic Life is surveying libraries to find out more about their civic/community engagement activities. Public, school, academic, government, state and special libraries are undertaking exciting programs that engage their communities in civic life. Please fill out the survey posted at http://connect.ala.org/node/151545 and return it to us by the end of July. We have included a sample survey so you can get a better sense of the type of efforts of interest. We will use the data to map the civic work going on throughout the country and highlight your important work. The map will help others find you and link you to similarly minded groups in your area. Thanks.

The Kogod School of Business at American University and the National University of Ireland, Galway, are collaborating on a research project that investigates the value of federal government web sites. Professors Murray Scott and William DeLone are leading the project; they are particularly interested in the value created in recent initiatives designed to promote citizen engagement and participation.

The researchers would very much appreciate your support by following the link below and completing the survey. The survey should not take any longer than 15 minutes of your time and can be found at: http://govsurvey.nuigalway.ie

The researchers can be contacted with any questions or comments at murray.scott@nuigalway.ie or wdelone@american.edu

Last July, Nancy Kranich, Joanne Griffin and Holly Sorenson presented a program at ALA Annual for the Association of College & Research Libraries Division. Somehow we neglected to post the podcast of their presentation that is now available for those who were unable to attend. Below is the e-mail message from Chad Kahl with the access information.

I would like to thank you again for attending the 2009 Law and Political
Science Section ALA Annual Conference program, “Political Engagement:
Facilitating Greater Participation in Civil Society” featuring Elizabeth
Hollander, Nancy Kranich, Joanne Griffin and Holly Sorensen.

If you are attending ALA or can get to Chicago or know a student in Chicago who wants to make a little pin money and get into the exhibitor’s booth and our MIG meeting, please forward…

How do you get started if you want to make a difference in America?

That is the question posed by NOW on PBS executive producer John Siceloff and writer Jason Maloney in their book, Your America: Democracyâ€™s Local Heroes and answered in the inspiring biographies of grassroots activists and companion video produced by NOW on PBS. http://www.pbs.org/now/youramerica

PBS NOW is seeking a representative to work at the Palgrave Macmillan publisherâ€™s booth at the ALA conference in Chicago July 11-14 to promote the book, Your America.

AND they are willing to pay $25 per hour for three hours per day – you make your own schedule between 9:00-5:00 July 11-13 and 9-2 on the 14th!

Iâ€™ve negotiated a couple of other perks that should be of interest â€¦

Hereâ€™s what you will get in addition to $75 per day for 3 hours of work:

An exhibitor badge that will get you into the ALA exhibit halls

You will also get to attend the ALA Membership Initiative Group: Libraries Foster Civic Engagement on Sunday, July 12, 2009, 10:30 – 12:00 pm (See Blog announcement: http://tinyurl.com/lno26q ) This is a great place to meet librarians who are involved in civic engagement and social justice issues in their communities!

A copy of the book Americaâ€™s Heroes

Hereâ€™s what you need to do:

Be at the exhibitorâ€™s booth for three hours per day to promote the book, answer questions, and take down information or queries for the publisher

I just received notice of a Director of Citizen Engagement position from my friend Joe Goldman over at AmericaSpeaks. AmericaSpeaks has engaged thousands of citizens in large-scale projects on participatory budgeting, rebuilding New Orleans, the New York Listening to the City project, the arts, and health care in California just to name a few. The tools in their toolbox include keypad voting, online deliberation, research, community conversations and webcast meetings.

With an administration that is promoting transparency, participation and collaboration, this is an exciting time to be involved in citizen engagement.So send Joe a line if you are interested in working in D.C. with a dynamic organization doing important work!